<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Boiling Over by TalesOfOnyxBats</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25824583">Boiling Over</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TalesOfOnyxBats/pseuds/TalesOfOnyxBats'>TalesOfOnyxBats</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Betrayal, F/F, Femslash, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Recovery</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 02:22:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,912</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25824583</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TalesOfOnyxBats/pseuds/TalesOfOnyxBats</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Day 1: Role Swap<br/>Summary: Azula betrays TyLee at the Boiling Rock.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Azula/Ty Lee (Avatar)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>97</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Boiling Over</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>There is a beating behind her ears. A soft pounding, born of fear and anticipation. Mai draws her blade and TyLee drops into a stance. Azula watches the gondola roll away, bobbing on the line that had very nearly been cut. She locks eyes with her brother only briefly before it lurches away. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Azula, what are you doing!?” TyLee asks.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>What aren’t you doing would be the better question, Azula thinks to herself.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Don’t let them get away!” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But she does, she watches the gondola slip away into safety, beyond the Boiling Rock.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>For it, she is a traitor to her own nation, to her father and an embarrassment to herself. Just as Zuko is. She curses herself for her last minute weakness. For going momentarily soft. She could have stopped Mai. She should have. But she didn’t and now Zuzu is a free traitor once more, a danger to his Nation and everything their father has worked to build. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You ruined everything we’ve been fighting for!” She hears the hurt in TyLee’s declaration. “Azula worked so hard to get us here, and you ruined everything!” She looks to the princess for back up. Again, Azula finds herself faltering and she hates herself for it. For the sudden onslaught of weakness. Just as she had been torn between glory and her brother’s life, she is torn between her childhood friends. Her only friends. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She has never seen TyLee like this and she isn’t sure what has gone astray in the girl’s mind. She thinks that it might be her own fault, that her influence has seeped in much further than she had intended. Seeing her own mannerisms reflected back on her via TyLee is rattling. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We’ll catch him again.” Azula mutters.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No.” Mai holds her ground. “We won’t.” This time it is she who turns to Azula for support. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The princess remains silent. She catches a glint as Mai draws her blades, hears the quick metallic slide as she holds them up. Before she can let the blades loose, TyLee makes a jab for her throat and Azula’s breath catches in her own. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her father has created a monster in her and now she has created one in TyLee.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At least she has the decency to feel guilty over it. The very same sense of shame is what compels her to swat TyLee’s hand to the side. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The girl looks at her quizzically, “what are you doing, Azula? I’m doing this for you.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The princess’ stomach lurches again. TyLee plays on her guilt without realizing it at all. “What you can do for me is let Zuzu go, we’ll figure out what to do about him when we get home.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Home? You want to go home? Wait until your dad hears about this!” TyLee exclaims. “What do you think that he’s going to say? Th-this is treason isn’t it?” The slight tremble is the only thing that betrays her anxiety. Or perhaps it is anger that her voice shakes with.  There is something in her eyes that Azula has never seen. Something dangerous. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Something she has, without a doubt, instills. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She supposes that she deserves whatever is to come. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And it comes without warning. TyLee raises her pointer and Azula braces herself for another attack. Instead the girl calls out to the guards, “they’re both traitors to the Fire Lord’s crown. They assisted war prisoners and a traitor’s escape.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Maybe it is because the demand  catches her off guard, the venomous way in which it is delivered that is so unbefitting of TyLee. More likely it is because she doesn’t expect them to obey her over their princess. Either which way, she doesn’t react on time.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <b>.oOo.</b>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Prison is a dreadful place. She is kept far away from Mai, her co-conspirator, and locked away with a Kyoshi Warrior, one of Suki’s companions. Azula is potently aware that it is her fault that the Kyoshi Warrior is here in prison with her. And the Kyoshi Warrior is just as displeasured as she is about her cellmate. But at least the warrior is humored, Azula herself takes no joy in it at all. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So how does the Fire Nation Princess end up in a high security Fire Nation prison?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t care to answer, not in full. Not when it so painfully brings up the several critical mistakes that have landed her here, disgraced her, and striped her of her pride. Not when TyLee’s angry and conflicted expression keeps resurfacing in her mind. “Careless mistakes.” She mutters. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It is a drab existence, really. Monotonous and dull at the best of times, grueling, humiliating, and cruel at the worst of them. She thinks that the drab monotony is what gets Mai through it, she doesn’t seem to complain. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>For herself, the guards and fellow inmates alike get a particular kick out of mocking her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>For inmates it is vengeance. For guards it is a powertrip--a way to feel bold and impress their friends; it earns them the right to brag about how they had successfully antagonized the very same  princess who’d taken Ba Sing Se. </span>
</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>
  <span>They have a very special resentment for her, giving her harder labor and less filling food rations. WIth the sun beating down so mercilessly as she shovels coal away for transport and her stomach aching for food, more than once she has collapsed. Each time she wakes up back in her cell feeling weak, fatigued, and the pounding of a vicious headache. Each time she wakes, she feels less human. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They also throw her in the coolers more than anyone else. She doesn’t particularly have to do anything to land herself there. She simply has to bring her shovel down at the wrong angle and they throw her in. They leave her until her temperature drops dangerously low. The torture only stopped when they’d nearly killed her. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She wasn’t the same after that. She still isn’t the same. Any semblance of her royal heritage and habits have fled. Her domineering demeanor has deteriorated into an embarrassing submissiveness. She doesn’t bother with her appearance, nobody looks good in tattered prison garb. She bothers less with her manners, she is treated like lowlife, she may as well remove the stress of trying to act like anything else. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>After a certain point Azula has resigned herself to the abuses and neglects. Between the lack of meals, the straining work, and the frequent trips to the coolers she has lost her fight. That might be what prompts them to allow her to see Mai. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t speak much anyhow. For a change, Mai does all of the talking. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Her cellmate grows less hostile after witnessing, firsthand, the way the other inmates shove her around and kick her as they throw accusations at her. At least they have justifiable reasons to mistreat her, unlike the guards. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>If the guards treat Mai poorly, she can only imagine how the earth and waterbenders are treated.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She wonders if Zuko knows about her situation...if he is giddy over it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She isn’t sure that she will make it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She isn’t sure that anyone will care if she doesn’t.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <b>.oOo.</b>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>By the time they pull her from the Boiling Rock, she is a different person. As few words as she had said to Mai, she says less now. She doesn’t talk at all. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Sozin’s comet had been her liberation. In case Aang and his friends were to lose, she fought her own way out. She rained fire down upon the guards, upon those who she used to command and root for. She blasts her way through walls and finds herself working with the waterbenders to get across the searingly hot moat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Suddenly they had no problem with her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>No grudges.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No vendettas. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>No resentment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They were her allies. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When they reached their freedom they tried to make conversation, tred to forge friendship. They apologized for mistreating her so terribly. Dimly, Azula was aware that she should return the apologies, accept the friendships. But she had been so thoroughly bone tired. She hadn’t the energy for forgiveness nor resentments of her own. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She was also abundantly aware that she should have felt exhilarated and reborn having her fire so powerfully amplified. Having it coursing so rawly through her body and soul. Having received a reminder that she is still strong. It seemed as though her pride had taken a much more profound hit than she would have guessed. Even with the comet she was once so jubilant about, she felt small and weak. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then she felt nothing at all. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She is only just regaining a sense of herself, some semblance of the old her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The first time she’d felt a swell of dignity was like a breath of fresh, air temple air. It was when she was taken to Zuko’s coronation and surprised with a crown of her own. It had been a true honor to have it placed upon her head with an agreement that they’d rule the Fire Nation together, filling in for each other’s weaknesses and bringing out each other’s strengths.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It had been so nice, but the euphoria is wearing off and she is feeling unwell again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Numb again and she isn’t sure why. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They treat her well, everyone treats her well. When she runs into the guards who’d tormented her, they have the decency to slink back in shame. But Azula still feels so hollow. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>This emptiness has led her to the institution TyLee had been transferred to. TyLee who had been so loyal and driven by friendship. TyLee who had been mercilessly betrayed. Azula knows that she should be angry with the girl for leaving her at the mercy of the Boiling Rock, but she knows just as well that it is her own fault. She had molded and manipulated the girl to such a degree that she’d lost herself. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And then Azula drove her mad by betraying her for the views that she’d instilled. Between the loss of her friends, the inner conflict, and a share of her own guilt for having the two of them locked away, it is no wonder the acrobat had slipped. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Azula drops onto her bed and sits as quietly as ever. She doesn’t know what to say. She is just as broken, she just doesn’t have the asylum robes to prove it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What happened to your hands?” TyLee asks. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It was the shackles that they had much too tightly fixed to her wrists. She lies, “during the comet I underestimate how large my fire would be…” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t think that TyLee entirely buys the lie, she knows that Azula is too careful for that. Too aware of her own limits. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Why are you visiting me? I had you and Mai thrown in prison!”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Because of me.” Azula admits. “You threw me in prison because you were imitating </span>
  <em>
    <span>me</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” She draws a sharp breath. She doesn’t have much pride left anyways, she might as well admit that she isn’t a good person. That she just so happened to be on the right side at the right time, and not even by choice particularly. “I...I did this to you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>TyLee sits up and takes her hand. “Yeah…” she trails off. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Azula’s stomach drops at her outright agreement. “Why haven’t you told me to leave?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Because I like you. I like you and Mai.” She replies. “That’s why I’m here, because I am alone. I don’t like being alone.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You shouldn’t…” Azula mumbles. “Like me, I mean. And you won’t be alone…” but she will be once she convinces Mai that this whole mess is more her fault than TyLee’s. “Mai will come around.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She hates the sound of TyLee’s crying. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hates that it, like all else, is her fault. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She wishes that the Boiling Rock would have hardened her further rather than softened her. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <b>.oOo. </b>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Bringing TyLee home is far more than a relief. Really, TyLee is no danger at all. Save for the lapse at the Boiling Rock, she isn’t a violent person. She was just sad, terribly and hopelessly sad. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>To see the smile return to her face is wonderful, even if it is at the cost of her own. She had success in persuading everyone that TyLee’s slip was her fault, that she’d weaponized TyLee in the same way her father had weaponized her. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Now she is lonely. But, frankly, Azula had suspected that she would end up alone. Or at most it would just be she and her father. The path to power and glory, especially power, is a lonely one. And yet she’d chosen it. She still has her crown, but it is all that she has. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That and the knowledge that she has helped ease TyLee’s pain. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>At least her mind won’t be bogged down with guilt. But it is weighed down by immense sorrow, as though she has syphoned it right from TyLee. She spends most of her day sitting on her throne or laying in bed. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>TyLee is well on her way to recovery and she feels broken again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She feels broken until TyLee comes to lay down next to her. It is a quiet affair, the acrobat snuggles close and puts her arms around Azula. Occasionally she rubs comforting circles on the fire lord’s back.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She joins them for breakfast the next morning and they welcome her surprisingly readily. They make light conversation with her, they ask her if she is doing any better, if they can help her feel well again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She begins to think that she has only imagined their anger. At the very least, she has exaggerated the extent of it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Her eyes well with relief.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hates it. She hates the weakness with every bit of her soul. All the same, she thinks that she needed a good cry. When it is over she feels almost normal again. She feels lighter. Freer. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Azula lets TyLee run a comb through her hair just like old times while Mai lounges in the corner of the room, twirling a knife as she reads through several scrolls. She isn’t sure how long this has gone on for but the candle has been burned to a stub. Mai puts her scrolls aside and declares that she is going to bed. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When Mai takes her leave, she and TyLee have a long talk.A very long and deep talk. By its end Azula feels equally distraught and absolved. She let TyLee confess every little thing that is on her mind; every time Azula had frightened or coerced her. She speaks of them until Azula wonders if their friendship had been genuine at all. She tells Azula of each time that she’d felt belittled and each time she’d felt manipulated. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She wonders if her feeling of gloom registers on her face. It must have because TyLee takes her hand and says, “your turn. Just say it all and don’t hold anything back. Tell me about the Boiling Rock.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Azula swallows and begins, she lays out her former and sudden feelings of inferiority. Lays out her mistrust and mentions that she still sometimes dreams of being trapped in those coolers, mercilessly cut off from her fire, from her essence. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She speaks of the abuses and neglections, deciding to spare TyLee the more gritty details.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She talks until TyLee grows teary eyed and, though she has more to say, she leaves it at that. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And then they are quiet for such a long time. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>An hour at least.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Admittedly that hour was spent in anxiety. Spent with the constant fear that TyLee was going to get up and never re-enter. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Instead the acrobat smile and says, “I’m glad that we finally got all of that out.” She gives a small but cheerful laugh. “Now we can talk about better things, right?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Azula nods, “yes, better things.” Though she isn’t sure what those are. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I told you about all of the ways you hurt me, now I want to talk about how you helped me.” Her smile brightens. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’ve...helped you?” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>TyLee nods. “I learned to stand up for myself. I got to do amazing things and make a name for myself…” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She talks nearly as long about these good things as she had about the bad. And, Agni, does Azula hope that she can add to that list until it outweighs the dreadful things. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Your turn.” TyLee rubs the back of her hands with her thumbs. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Azula finds that she has a lot more to say now than she had before. Namely she thinks that TyLee has made her a better person. Though it was such a harsh awakening, she has a feeling that it will do her better in the long run. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>TyLee takes her into her arms and squeezes her tightly. The fire lord returns the embrace, resting her chin on the other girl’s shoulder. She tightens her own hold, deciding that she doesn’t want the acrobat to slip away again. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m glad that I haven’t lost you.” TyLee says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She is glad too. Far more than glad. TyLee breaks out of the hug and presses a kiss upon Azula’s forehead. “It hurt so much when I thought that I did.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Azula returns the kiss with one of her own.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span> “It hurt because I love you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>For all of the hard truths they’d revealed that night, it is unbelievably easier for her to confess, “I love you too, TyLee.” </span>
</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>